Sleeping Beauty Wakes
by Wildwood Queen
Summary: A rewriting of Sleeping Beauty in which an ugly princess searches for beauty but finds strength instead.


Once upon a time in a land far away and very near, there lived a princess who was not beautiful. As a child, she was appallingly tall and awkwardly thin, with messy hair and teeth that stuck out. Despite her parents ardent entreaties, she was not able to make herself more beautiful. At last her parents despaired and said "Alas, not all ugly ducklings become swans." Because she was, as people so very politely put it, ugly, she was considered an altogether unpleasant character, so she decided she could not bear it any longer.

Now, in the village there lived an old woman who was known to be a witch. The villagers said she turned people into frogs and lured children into her cottage with magical sweets and kept maidens locked in towers until their hair grew so long that you could climb it like a ladder. In truth, she had never done any of those things (although the things she had done were much more interesting and far more creative). But because she very old and lived alone and had an unfathomable smile which said "I know a secret that you do not", the villagers reasoned that she must be a witch.

So princess donned peasant garb and travelled down to the village to visit this witch. She knocked on the door and the witch invited her in. They had tea and biscuits and talked about the weather and politics and the state of modern literature — until the princess could not bear it any longer and asked "Will I ever be beautiful?"

And the witch smiled her unfathomable smile. She hobbled (for she was incredibly old) over to her closet, rummaged around and pulled out a spinning wheel. It was old and worn but the spindle was wickedly sharp.

"It will be a long journey. Hard too," the witch said. "The road is lined with thorns."

But the princess felt she could bear thorns if it meant she could have roses.

The princess reached out and touched the spindle. No sooner had her finger met with the spindle than she had fallen into a deep sleep.

But sleep is not death and in her sleep, the princess dreamed. She dreamed of fields and forests and majestic mountain ranges and golden deserts with trains of camels trekking across them. So it was that the world tipped and tilted until at last it settled and the princess found herself wandering across a windswept plain.

She broke into a run. Hills rolled past her and she paused at a quaint old town cradled by a valley. There was a mill and a red-steepled church and little baker's shop with a thatched roof. Yet all around, the people the village stared at her and whispered to each other.

"I must not stop here," she told herself.

She began to run again and trees rose and fell around her and she came to a city with houses of glass as tall as mountains, sun-speckled streets with beasts of iron and steel that roared and rushed past them. Yet all around the people stared at her and whispered to each other.

"Do not even think about stopping here," she said.

So for the third time, she ran. She ran fast and strong. The world blurred and great mountains rose and tumbled. Ponds turned to lakes which turned to oceans. She passed by great cities ravaged by war and many other things which made her hurry on faster. Long and far she ran. The sun rose and set and rose and set again until at last she saw in the distance glimmering lights all warm and pumpkin gold. She saw shadows of strange things which she did quite not recognise and could not quite see. She knew she must go there.

She rushed onwards with a speed she did not know she could muster and she looked and saw the witch running alongside her. The princess saw she was still old and wrinkled but also nimble and quick as she no longer hobbled. The light brightened and the shadows deepened.

"You have been asleep for a hundred years," said the witch. "It is time to go home."

The princess wanted to stay in the land of sleep and seek the land from whence the shadows fell. She knew this with all her being, deep in the place where she knew her own name and that the face in the mirror was her face for all time. She knew she that if only she tried she could reach out and touch it but she could feel the waking world pulling at her like an invisible thread.

And the two women: one old, one young looked into the distance at the place that they were running to and the old woman said to the young woman "Someday we will get there." Then she smiled her unfathomable smile.

So when a prince from a distant land heard of a sleeping princess in enchanted castle and climbed to the top of the tower and opened the door and expected to see a beautiful princess lying asleep, it was to his great surprise that he saw instead a young woman (with messy hair and teeth that stuck out) sitting up in bed. She smiled, and, to add to the prince's astonishment said "Good morning."


End file.
